NEW END NOTES @ COMING ATTRACTIONS
7dec14 ref: "Days Of Infamy"
To honor this date we just remind readers of
"Escape from Wake"
from the Annals of the Air Transport Command in Flightspirit #1 (2012)
where-in the Philippine Clipper finally makes it off on the third desperate try.
Here we re-post this recent News Story of what they left behind:
"Escape from Wake"
from the Annals of the Air Transport Command in Flightspirit #1 (2012)
where-in the Philippine Clipper finally makes it off on the third desperate try.
Here we re-post this recent News Story of what they left behind:
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KTVB, KTVB.COM 9:46 p.m. MST November 24, 2013
http://www.ktvb.com/story/news/local/2014/07/01/11848247/ Wake Island survivors reunite 71 years later BOISE -- Four men older than 90 gathered in Boise Friday with their families for an annual reunion. It was 71 years ago and they were all around 19-years-old and signed on with Morrison Knudsen to build an army base on Wake Island in the South Pacific. "They were paying pretty good then during the Depression years, $120 a month," said Joe Goicoechea, who went to work on Wake Island. "We were going to become millionaires!" A couple months after 1,100 civilians arrived (about 250 were from Idaho), they were bombed by the Japanese military. "It was about four hours after they bombed Pearl Harbor that they hit Wake Island," said J.O. Young, a Wake Island survivor. Even though they had no military training, they helped the 250 Marines on the island try to repel the attack. "You didn't think anything about it," said Young. "You were there. You had a job to do, and you did it." "Everybody tried to do their best," said Goicoechea. "When you're not trained for it and all, it was pretty hard. But we had a lot of casualties." "We had always heard that there would be no prisoners," said Young. "So we were just going to fight until we were no more." But with their energy and supplies exhausted, they were forced to surrender. The Japanese did take prisoners. Ninety-eight workers were left on the island to finish work on the base that would serve the Japanese military. They were murdered after its completion. "A couple of them went to high school with me here," said Goicoechea. The men who survived, like Joe and J.O., would spend the next four years in brutal POW camps. "Some of the fellas were beat up constantly," said Young. "It was cold," said Goicoechea. " We had very little clothes. We had a hard time." But in 1945 when the war ended, they finally came home. Young talked about who he saw from the ship as he arrived back in the U.S. "There was a little blonde in a red dress waving, and I finally decided that was my girl, Pearl. On the 9th of November we just celebrated our 67th anniversary." Only 600 of the original 1,100 civilians made it home. Some family members of the survivors who have since passed away were also at the reunion. A monument to those who fought on Wake Island was dedicated at Veterans Memorial Park last year. It was mostly thanks to the work of a high school student whose great-grandfather died in that battle. * * * <------------------------------------> Editor note: This article is included in its entirety because it illustrates several points referenced elsewhere in flightspirit and the Air Transport Command commemorative: 1) It shows that many WWII veterans yet live today and 2) that they have a story to tell which are critical to knowing those times. 3) They confirm, for instance, that the Wake Island attack occurred on the same day as Pearl making it the first on- the-ground combat contact of the war (see "Day of Infamy" FSM#1). 4) They also confirm the belief at the time there would be no prisoners, which is part of the controversy of the Wake Island movie of 1942 which posed an "alamo (to the last man) ending". 5) They also confirm prison camp conditions reflected in "Operation Blacklist" previewed for upcoming issue of Flight Spirit Magazine. 6) The article also gives numbers and vague descriptions of what did become of the garrison including the 600 who return via Air Transport Command in Operation Magic Carpet. And last but not least it shows that a student can give good effect by can-do which our student and other readers here can do also here by bringing in Grandfathers' stories of the
Air Transport Command. Please send Display Submissions and inquiries to [email protected]
[ED NOTE: WE HAVE A GOOGLE NEWS ALERT FOR AIR TRANSPORT COMMAND AND HAVE GOTTEN EXACTLY ZERO NEWS OR COMMENT OR HONORIFIC HITS. THIS MEANS THAT THIS WEBSITE IS THE SOLE VOICE FOR THE VETERANS OF AIR TRANSPORT COMMAND AND WE URGE READERS TO PARTICIPATE DIRECTLY HERE VIA THE FORUMS, THE ROSTER, AND THE SCALE MODEL SQUADRONS.
THE EVENT WINDOW DESCRIBED ABOVE OCCURS EVERY YEAR ---@--@--o--@--@---The evolution of FlightSpirit actually never ends and what we call "End Notes" is only the latest addition so far to this issue (#3). We will be having an occasion in the next issue to bring around a full circle when our Wake Island Survivors are rescued in Operation Blacklist and the further ATC missions of Magic Carpet. We will also be spotlighting the Wake Island movie (1942) as part of our new Flight in Film series and we leave you now with this link to a documentary about the Wake Island survivors.
Smoke rises from Wake Island after a Japanese air attack. The command post used by the detachment of the 1st Defense Battalion lies in the right foreground. December 1941
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Please send Display Submissions and inquiries to
[email protected]
[email protected]